The closest I ever came to the advice my father gave me when he saw me off
to Belgrade happened during the war, in 1942.
It was sometime in the summer, after I had escaped from Zemun to Belgrade
as a refugee.
They told me:
“Refugees are entitled to receive some of the clothes being distributed.”
So I went. It was in the building where the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
stands today, in Kneza Miloša Street.
We were all standing outside in a queue, waiting.
And every time I was almost at the front, the man keeping order would say:
“You, little girl, why are you pushing in? Go to the back.”
He sent me back like that once or twice.
Why he kept sending me back, I had no idea.
And then all of a sudden I remembered:
“Didn’t you tell me never to take anything džabe?”
So I stepped out of the queue and went home.
I got nothing, and I didn’t want to take anything either,
because it was džabe.
I stayed at Milka and Žika Vićentić’s house until 1943.
That year there was another round of raids, rounding up young people
for forced labour in Germany. Minja’s godfather, who was a senior official
at the hospital, said:
“Come on, Minja, let Bojana come and work at the hospital. She’ll be
all right there. She doesn’t need a salary, she just needs somewhere
to keep out of sight.”
I fitted in well there. I worked in the laboratory and cleaned one
section where the offices, the X-ray department and the pharmacy were.
It was all easy enough for me.
But I had to be careful. I was always afraid there might be another
raid right behind me.
I was sad, with no hope for tomorrow.
One day I decided to go to the Oberin1,
whose name was Jolanda. I asked her to give me some night work —
cleaning the staff rooms — while during the day, in regular working
hours, I could work in the clinical laboratory with Dr Fesnak,
a wonderful man, a Russian.
He understood my situation and helped me enormously. Within a year,
I had learned almost all the techniques used in the clinical laboratory.
In return, I gave Dr Fesnak and his wife my lunch — a very meagre one —
while I would go to Minja’s, wash the dishes there, and have lunch.